Part 42

It was a fatal admission on the part of the tortured little woman; under the German military law her having helped soldiers to reach Holland, a neutral country, would have been a less serious offense, but to aid them to reach an enemy country, and especially England, was the last offense in the eyes of the German military court.

The trial was concluded on Saturday, and on Sunday one of the nurses in Miss Cavell's school came to tell me that there was a rumor about town that the prosecuting officer had asked the court to pronounce a sentence of death in the cases of the Princess de Croy, the Countess de Belleville, and of Miss Cavell, and of several others. I remember to have said to Maître de Leval, when he came up to my room to report the astounding news:

"That's only the usual exaggeration of the prosecutor; they all ask for the extreme penalty, everywhere, when they sum up their cases."

"Yes," said Maître de Leval, "and in German courts they always get it."

Maître de Leval sent a note to Maître Kirschen, asking him to come on Monday, at eight-thirty o'clock, to the Legation or to send a word regarding Miss Cavell. Maître Kirschen did not send Maître de Leval the word he had requested, and on that Sunday, de Leval saw another lawyer who had been on the case and could tell him what had taken place at the trial. The lawyer thought that the court martial would not condemn Miss Cavell to death. At any rate, no judgment had been pronounced, and the judges themselves did not appear to be in agreement.

On Monday, the eleventh of October, at eight-thirty in the morning, Maître de Leval went to the Politische Abteilung in the Rue Lambermont, and found Conrad. He spoke to him of the case of Miss Cavell and asked that, now that the trial had taken place, he and the Reverend Mr. Gahan, the rector of the English church, be allowed to see Miss Cavell. Conrad said he would make inquiries and inform de Leval by telephone, and by one of the messengers of the Legation who that morning happened to deliver some papers to the Politische Abteilung, Conrad sent word that neither the Reverend Mr. Gahan nor Maître de Leval could see Miss Cavell at that time, but that Maître de Leval could see her as soon as the judgment had been pronounced.

At eleven-thirty o'clock on the Monday morning, Maître de Leval himself telephoned to Conrad, who repeated this statement. The judgment had not yet been rendered, he said, and Maître de Leval asked him to let him know as soon as the judgment had been pronounced, so that he might go to see Miss Cavell. Conrad promised this, but added that even then the Reverend Mr. Gahan could not see her, because there were German Protestant pastors at the prison, and that if Miss Cavell needed spiritual advice or consolation she could call on them. Conrad concluded this conversation by saying that the judgment would be rendered on the morrow, that is, on Tuesday, or the day after, and that even when it had been pronounced it would have to be signed by the Military Governor, and that the Legation would be kept informed.

At twelve-ten on the Monday, not having received any news from Maître Kirschen, Maître de Leval went to his house, but did not find him there, and left his card.

At twelve-twenty o'clock, Maître de Leval went to the house of the lawyer to whom reference has already been made, and left word for him to go to his home.

At four o'clock that afternoon the lawyer arrived at the Legation and said that he had been to see the Germans at eleven o'clock, and that there he had been told no judgment would be pronounced before the following day. Before leaving the Legation to go home, Maître de Leval told to Gibson all that had happened, and asked him to telephone again to Conrad before going home himself. Then at intervals all day long the inquiry had been repeated, and the same response was made.

Monday evening at six-twenty o'clock, Belgian time, Topping, one of the clerks of the Legation, with Gibson standing by, again called Conrad on the telephone, again was told that the judgment had not been pronounced, and that the Political Department would not fail to inform the Legation the moment the judgment was confirmed. And the chancellerie was closed for the night.

At nine o'clock that Monday evening, Maître de Leval appeared suddenly at the door of my chamber; his face was deadly pallid; he said that he had just heard from the nurse who kept him informed, that the judgment had been confirmed and that the sentence of death had been pronounced on Miss Cavell at half-past four o'clock that afternoon, and that she was to be shot at two o'clock the next morning. It seemed preposterous, especially the immediate execution of sentence; there had always been time at least to prepare and present a plea for mercy. To condemn a woman in the evening and then to hurry her out to be shot before another dawn! Impossible! It could not be!

But no; Maître de Leval was certain. That evening he had gone home and was writing at his table when about eight o'clock two nurses were introduced. One was Miss Wilkinson, little and nervous, all in tears; the other, taller and more calm. Miss Wilkinson said that she had just learned that the judgment of the court condemned Miss Cavell to death, that the judgment had been read to her in her cell at four-thirty that afternoon, and that the Germans were going to shoot her that night at two o'clock. Maître de Leval told her that it was difficult to believe such news, since twice he had been told that the judgment had not been rendered and that it would not be rendered before the following day, but on her reiteration that she had this news from a source that was absolutely certain, de Leval left at once with her and her friends and came to the Legation. And there he stood, pale and shaken. Even then I could not believe; it was too preposterous; surely a stay of execution would be granted. Already in the afternoon, in some premonition, Maître de Leval had prepared a plea for mercy, to be submitted to the Governor-General, and a letter of transmittal to present to the Baron von der Lancken. I asked Maître de Leval to bring me these documents and I signed them, and then, at the last minute, on the letter addressed to von der Lancken, I wrote these words:

"MY DEAR BARON:

"I am too sick to present my request to you in person, but I appeal to your generosity of heart to support it, and save this unfortunate woman from death. Have pity on her."

I told Maître de Leval to send Joseph at once to hunt up Gibson to present my plea and, if possible, to find the Marquis de Villalobar and to ask him to support it with the Baron von der Lancken. Gibson was dining somewhere; we did not know where Villalobar was. The Politische Abteilung, in the Ministry of Industry, where Baron von der Lancken lived, was only half a dozen blocks away. The Governor-General was in his château at Trois Fontaines, ten miles away, playing bridge that evening. Maître de Leval went; and I waited.

The nurses from Miss Cavell's school were waiting in a lower room; other nurses came for news; they, too, had heard, but could not believe. Then the Reverend Mr. H. Stirling T. Gahan, the British chaplain at Brussels and pastor of the English church, came. He had a note from some one at the St. Gilles prison, a note written in German, saying simply:

"Come at once; some one is about to die."

He went away to the prison; his frail, delicate little wife remained at the Legation, and there, with my wife and Miss Larner, sat with those women all that long evening, trying to comfort them, to reassure them. Outside a cold rain was falling. Up in my chamber I waited; a stay of execution would be granted, of course; they always were; there was not, in our time, anywhere, a court, even a court martial, that would condemn a woman to death at half-past four in the afternoon and hurry her out and shoot her before dawn--not even a German court martial.

When Mr. Gahan arrived at the prison that night Miss Cavell was lying on the narrow cot in her cell; she arose, drew on a dressing gown, folded it about her thin form, and received him calmly. She had never expected such an end to the trial, but she was brave and was not afraid to die. The judgment had been read to her that afternoon, there in her cell. She had written letters to her mother in England and to certain of her friends, and entrusted them to the German authorities.

She did not complain of her trial; she had avowed all, she said; and it is one of the saddest, bitterest ironies of the whole tragedy that she seems not to have known that all she had avowed was not sufficient, even under German law, to justify the judgment passed upon her. The German chaplain had been kind, and she was willing for him to be with her at the last, if Mr. Gahan could not be. Life had not been all happy for her, she said, and she was glad to die for her country. Life had been hurried, and she was grateful for these weeks of rest in prison.

"Patriotism is not enough," she said, "I must have no hatred and no bitterness toward any one."

She received the sacrament, she had no hatred for any one, and she had no regrets. In the touching report that Mr. Gahan made there is a statement, one of the last that Edith Cavell ever made, which, in its exquisite pathos, illuminates the whole of that life of stern duty, of human service and martyrdom. She said that she was grateful for the six weeks of rest she had just before the end. During those weeks she had read and reflected; her companions and her solace were her Bible, her prayer-book and the "Imitation of Christ." The notes she made in these books reveal her thoughts in that time, and will touch the uttermost depths of any nature nourished in that beautiful faith which is at once so tender and so austere. The prayer-book with those laconic entries on its fly-leaf, in which she set down the sad and eloquent chronology of her fate, the copy of the "Imitation" which she had read and marked during those weeks in prison--weeks, which, as she so pathetically said, had given her rest and quiet and time to think in a life that had been "so hurried"--and the passages noted in her firm hand have a deep and appealing pathos.

Just before the end, too, as I have said, she wrote a number of letters. She forgot no one. Among the letters that she left one was addressed to the nurses of her school; and there was a message for a girl who was trying to break herself of the morphine habit--Miss Cavell had been trying to help her, and she sent her word to be brave, and that if God would permit she would continue to try to help her.

Midnight came, and Gibson, with a dark face, and de Leval, paler than ever. There was nothing to be done.

De Leval had gone to Gibson, and together they went in search of the Marquis, whom they found at Baron Lambert's, where he had been dining; he and Baron Lambert and M. Francqui were over their coffee. The three, the Marquis, Gibson and de Leval, then went to the Rue Lambermont. The little Ministry was closed and dark; no one was there. They rang, and rang again, and finally the concierge appeared--no one was there, he said. They insisted. The concierge at last found a German functionary who came down, stood staring stupidly; every one was gone; son Excellence was at the theater. At what theater? He did not know. They urged him to go and find out. He disappeared inside, went up and down stairs two or three times, finally came out and said that he was at Le Bois Sacré. They explained that the presence of the Baron was urgent and asked the man to go for him; they turned over the motor to him and he mounted on the box beside Eugene. They reached the little variety theater there in the Rue d'Arenberg. The German functionary went in and found the Baron, who said he could not come before the piece was over.

All this while Villalobar, Gibson and de Leval were in the salon at the Ministry, the room of which I have spoken so often as the yellow salon, because of the satin upholstery of its Louis XVI. furniture of white lacquer--that bright, almost laughing little salon, all done in the gayest, lightest tones, where so many little dramas were played. All three of them were deeply moved and very anxious--the eternal contrast, as de Leval said, between things and sentiments. Lancken entered at last, very much surprised to find them; he was accompanied by Count Harrach and by the young Baron von Falkenhausen.

"What is it, gentlemen?" he said. "Has something serious happened?"